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The idea of sustainability is pretty simple: Manage our resources such that they can continue to support us indefinitely. And, for an individual resource, sustainability is simple. Avoiding something like depleting our groundwater means that future generations have access to as much water as we do and don't face the consequences of sinking soil.

But sustainability gets complicated when you start considering multiple, competing uses. Cutting back on water usage may influence things like agriculture, energy production, and more, making them less sustainable.

Further Reading

Just how complicated does all of this get? Lei Gao and Brett Bryan of Australia's CSIRO research organization decided to use their home country as a test of sustainability goals, and the results are disheartening. While moving any aspect of land use into the "sustainable" column is possible, the more aspects you try to push into that column, the harder it gets.

Setting priorities

To look into sustainability in a concrete manner, the authors started with the UN's Sustainable Development Goals. There are 17 of those, but Gao and Bryan focused on land use, which determined their priorities: sustainable food production, clean water, clean energy, limiting climate change, and maintaining biodiversity. The authors translated these into specific targets for 2030 and 2050 Australia at three levels of what they call "ambition."

(A weak target might be "slow the rate of groundwater depletion," a moderate target could be "stop groundwater depletion," while getting ambitious might be "restore groundwater levels to those prior to European arrival.")

The authors have a computerized modeling system, called Land-Use Trade-Offs (LUTO), that can project where things will be in response to a combination of economics, environmental constraints, and policy decisions. Given the constraints of policy and the environment, LUTO allocated land use based on what will provide the owners with the greatest return. Gao and Bryan also considered a variety of potential future scenarios, including different levels of climate change (and attempts to address it), as well as changes in Australia's population growth.

All these scenarios and considerations led to a dizzying array of potential results. So the authors analyzed them in terms of pathways—if you prioritize food production and start down that pathway, does it preclude anything else?

The answer is yes. "Simultaneous achievement of multiple targets is rare," the authors conclude, "owing to the complexity of sustainability target implementation and the pervasive trade-offs in resource-constrained land systems." It's possible to achieve more only by lowering your standards and accepting some of the weaker sustainability goals.

Competing interests

To give a sense of the trade-offs, we can start by looking at the scenarios in which addressing climate change is a priority. This leads to policies that promote reforestation, which can offset carbon emissions. New forests can also help with biodiversity, although complex ecologies takes a while to develop, so some of the benefits would be outside the time period being studied. Unfortunately, reforestation would also make water use less sustainable and, not surprisingly, displace agriculture. In fact, any serious attempts to address climate change involved reforestation and tipped water use into unsustainable territory.

Agriculture was also problematic in many pathways. To meet food production targets, there needed to be continued productivity improvements; without them, food started competing with other types of land-use priorities. Only eight percent of the pathways achieved biodiversity goals, typically when government policy prioritized it.

As a result of all these competing priorities, only a quarter of the pathways managed to hit two targets when the ambition was set to moderate. Ten percent hit three of them, and another 3.5 percent hit three. A full 18 percent of the pathways achieved none of the goals.

The easiest combo to hit together involved food, water, and biofuels. That's in part because the unused portions of food crop plants can be shunted into biofuel productions, assuming government policies prioritize the creation of the facilities to process them. But you'd only be prioritizing biofuels if you cared about climate change, and these pathways don't end up addressing that effectively.

None of this means that meeting goals is ultimately impossible. Solar and wind power prices have plunged so much that we have blown past a variety of goals that once seemed optimistic. But the CSIRO study does highlight that real sustainability requires solving multiple problems at once while balancing competing priorities. It may be a wicked problem, and no two countries are likely to end up with the exact same solutions. But that doesn't mean sustainability isn't a problem worth tackling.

Would be interesting in seeing such models tested against other regions:

- Australia clearly has a water constraint. Can that be traded into an energy constraint, through more extensive desalination ? That would seem to be a key local question for the future.

- Western Europe has a space constraint. Is that easier or harder to address than a shortage of water ? I suspect easier actually, but again, one would love to be able to comeback in 100 years and see how the problem has been addressed.

As a result of all these competing priorities, only a quarter of the pathways managed to hit two targets when the ambition was set to moderate. Ten percent hit three of them, and another 3.5 percent hit three. A full 18 percent of the pathways achieved none of the goals.

I believe evolution is the ultimate manifestation of the sustainability of the grand scheme of things. Landscapes come and go, ecosystems come and go, species come and go, something old perish, something new emerge, the game goes on.

Our notion of sustainability is preservation of the current state (for human existence and dominance) indefinitely, Nature may have other ideas.

I believe evolution is the ultimate manifestation of the sustainability of the grand scheme of things. Landscapes come and go, ecosystems come and go, species come and go, something old perish, something new emerge, the game goes on.

Our notion of sustainability is preservation of the current state (for human existence and dominance) indefinitely, Nature may have other ideas.

Evolution, by definition, takes place over many generations. Degradation of the environment can be much quicker, and often happens at a pace that evolution cannot keep up with.

If we don't pay attention to sustainability, we may produce a future world that cannot sustain even current populations of humans and wild things.

Australia is now seeing that in a big way with bleaching of its coral reefs, which could lead to a massive reduction in sea life on its continental shelf, which in turn could lead to big problems for people. All thanks to burning fossil fuels, by the way. That's what's poisoning the coral.

A large part of Australia receives very little rainfall while some parts are definitely tropical and receive regular rainfall.

A large amount of rainwater falling in the urban areas ends up draining to the sea via sewage canals. There must be a practical way to collect all that fresh water.

In my country the Philippines, i have diverted the rainfall on my roof to a piece of my lot (instead of going into the municipal sewage system)and let the water pool there since it does drain into the soil and im hoping that in my own little way i can contribute to replenish the underground water table.

Australia and sustainable at modern Civ levels? sounds like they decided their first playthrough would be at Hard Core Iron Man. Australia like many other places on this earth, is not even remotely ideal for having a full range of resources to create a sustainable ongoing Civ. This is why merchant shipping is so important on the international scale.

A large part of Australia receives very little rainfall while some parts are definitely tropical and receive regular rainfall.

A large amount of rainwater falling in the urban areas ends up draining to the sea via sewage canals. There must be a practical way to collect all that fresh water.

In my country the Philippines, i have diverted the rainfall on my roof to a piece of my lot (instead of going into the municipal sewage system)and let the water pool there since it does drain into the soil and im hoping that in my own little way i can contribute to replenish the underground water table.

During the last big drought the plan was to add more dams and link up most of those eastern seaboard dams via pumps, so we'd be both more drought and also flood resistant. People got all NIMBY and the drought broke so problem solved.

As for diverting roof water, rain water tanks are pretty common here depending on where you live. They've been banned for being unsightly in some areas though.

now, leap ahead some 2000 years, consider the population increase (less those lucky ones who have exited to those lovely exo planets and refuges on X-Resorts Unlimited of Uranus) scatter them among the slim available slots of semi arid land, hand them a spade, maybe a HDPE jug of recovered water and let them 'live off this land'....... (taken from Ron Reagans snappy quip to them Ruskies)

I remember an ecologist years ago claiming that Australia was already unsustainably populated by around a factor of two, and I've often repeated that claim and sometimes copped scorn for being naive (especially with the implied consequences for immigration this is a politically thorny subject), but this article suggests that that ecologist was on to something. Indeed, foreigners are often surprised how few people live in such a vast territory, but it really is mostly desert - a world away from the fertile European pastures in their minds.

A large part of Australia receives very little rainfall while some parts are definitely tropical and receive regular rainfall.

A large amount of rainwater falling in the urban areas ends up draining to the sea via sewage canals. There must be a practical way to collect all that fresh water.

In my country the Philippines, i have diverted the rainfall on my roof to a piece of my lot (instead of going into the municipal sewage system)and let the water pool there since it does drain into the soil and im hoping that in my own little way i can contribute to replenish the underground water table.

During the last big drought the plan was to add more dams and link up most of those eastern seaboard dams via pumps, so we'd be both more drought and also flood resistant. People got all NIMBY and the drought broke so problem solved.

As for diverting roof water, rain water tanks are pretty common here depending on where you live. They've been banned for being unsightly in some areas though.

lucky you. some regions of Calipornica USA, have strict restrictions regarding 'watta from heven'. put in a rain barrel and you get a visit from the county watta enforcement thugs. no joke!

A large part of Australia receives very little rainfall while some parts are definitely tropical and receive regular rainfall.

A large amount of rainwater falling in the urban areas ends up draining to the sea via sewage canals. There must be a practical way to collect all that fresh water.

In my country the Philippines, i have diverted the rainfall on my roof to a piece of my lot (instead of going into the municipal sewage system)and let the water pool there since it does drain into the soil and im hoping that in my own little way i can contribute to replenish the underground water table.

Just to nitpick, in Melbourne at any rate, the drains are separate to the sewerage system, as drain water is not treated before being discharged into rivers or the sea. However that reminds me of another water-saving measure that has had some negative consequences, which is that by reducing the amount of water entering the sewerage system (by for example reducing the volume in each toilet flush) the sewers don't flow as well, potentially causing blockages!

it is ironic that attempts by humans to improve on natural systems that evolved over millennia turn out to be unproductive or even damaging, despite observation of short-term benefits.

Suppressing forest fires leading to overgrown forests susceptible to disease and increased fire risk, humans congregating in areas that don't have enough proximate resources to support the new population (but are pretty [California] or have lots of dead dinosaurs underground [Dubai]), growing food that is desirable, but not necessary, and uses water in excess of availability (such as Almonds @ 2,100 gal./lb., vs. ironically Watermelon @ 31 gal./lb.), introducing invasive, non-native species such as Kudzu for idealistic or commercial reasons without understanding the gaps in natural limiting factors in the receiving ecosystem.

Given the number of variables operating in any single ecosystem, it is surprising that humans think they can alter only a handful of parameters without causing long-term sustainability problems, despite the apparently positive short-term gains that accompany many decisions.

One wonders if ecosystem modification simulations would require more or less computing power than weather prediction; humans have gotten much better at weather prediction over the past century, but very few people would bet their lives on a prediction that it will be sunny 20 days in the future, what makes us think that terraforming is less complex?

now, leap ahead some 2000 years, consider the population increase (less those lucky ones who have exited to those lovely exo planets and refuges on X-Resorts Unlimited of Uranus) scatter them among the slim available slots of semi arid land, hand them a spade, maybe a HDPE jug of recovered water and let them 'live off this land'....... (taken from Ron Reagans snappy quip to them Ruskies)

If that's the base SOL of people in 2000 years, forget about it. We're done. We either move up or out, and that's about all we can do.

Archologies, ecunomopoli, those are our future if we want to be anything like sustainable. In truth, it's all about the amount of energy our civilization can produce and how fast we can get to Kardashev 2+.

it is ironic that attempts by humans to improve on natural systems that evolved over millennia turn out to be unproductive or even damaging, despite observation of short-term benefits.

Suppressing forest fires leading to overgrown forests susceptible to disease and increased fire risk, humans congregating in areas that don't have enough proximate resources to support the new population (but are pretty [California] or have lots of dead dinosaurs underground [Dubai]), growing food that is desirable, but not necessary, and uses water in excess of availability (such as Almonds @ 2,100 gal./lb., vs. ironically Watermelon @ 31 gal./lb.), introducing invasive, non-native species such as Kudzu for idealistic or commercial reasons without understanding the gaps in natural limiting factors in the receiving ecosystem.

Given the number of variables operating in any single ecosystem, it is surprising that humans think they can alter only a handful of parameters without causing long-term sustainability problems, despite the apparently positive short-term gains that accompany many decisions.

One wonders if ecosystem modification simulations would require more or less computing power than weather prediction; humans have gotten much better at weather prediction over the past century, but very few people would bet their lives on a prediction that it will be sunny 20 days in the future, what makes us think that terraforming is less complex?

We're still in the early stages of really learning about our environment. Saying nay, haha, or whatever right now is like saying stuff like that to a kid that's making mistakes as they're still learning about the world around them: not particularly productive and inductive to creating bad habits. We need to develop good habits, including some degree of stewardship, but that will be a matter of time and effort on our part not really helped by the inherent negativity and scolding of a particular subset of individuals.

While there are certainly people that see only the short-term and are completely incapable of dealing with the long, and their behaviour is having very negative long-term effects, scolding them is going to no more useful than scolding trainees for making mistakes. Even less so, as they're likely to start ignoring you completely.

Those who are dealing with the long-term must be positive if they are to overcome the very real limitations we as people have right now in our thinking about the future. That means we look for solutions to not only the problems we've created, but also to the inherent problems placed on us by thermodynamics and general behaviour.

If everything I've written in this thread reads weird, I'd like to point out that I've been navel-gazing into the abyss and the abyss has navel-gazed back at me, and that's boring so right now I'm trying out different arguments for things like why our species (and the universe as a whole) should continue to exist, and how it might do so.

Or maybe I've always been bummed about the occlusion of Earth by Sol and the eventual heat-death of the universe.

To give a sense of the trade-offs, we can start by looking at the scenarios in which addressing climate change is a priority. This leads to policies that promote reforestation, which can offset carbon emissions

There are plenty of good reasons to preserve forests, and also to promote reforestation, but forests don't offset fossil fuel emissions; they're in steady-state balance with atmospheric CO2. In addition, the future of forests under current warming conditions is very iffy - look at the Canadian forests as an example. The Canadian government tried to claim that their forests were offsetting tar sands emissions, but then this happened by 2009:

Quote:

In an alarming yet little-noticed series of recent studies, scientists have concluded that Canada's precious forests, stressed from damage caused by global warming, insect infestations and persistent fires, have crossed an ominous line and are now pumping out more climate-changing carbon dioxide than they are sequestering

There really is no practical economic way to offset fossil fuel emissions; we just have to stop digging up ancient fossil fuel deposits and pumping their carbon into the atmosphere. One could theoretically pull billions of tons of CO2 out of the air and convert it to carbon fiber or carbonate rocks, but the energy costs would be monumental. It's far, far cheaper to just transition to renewables.

Uhh, surely step one of that is stating what those goals ARE?Chanting "sustainable" is not stating a goal. Is the goal - maintain today's lifestyle for a particular population?- allow the population to grow as it will and reduce lifestyle to compensate?

THAT is the issue no-one wants to clarify. The best you get is vague fudges like "well, population growth seems to be slowing so that problem will solve itself". OK, that's your sustainability plan, hope that things will just work out?

(BTW Australia's population growth rate ~1.4% or so for the last 50 years or so, with no obvious decline.)

Am I irritated by this? You're damn right I am. Exactly how does it help the situation to keep publishing articles like this that all, uniformly, refuse to admit the existence of, and consequences of, the elephant in the room?

I believe evolution is the ultimate manifestation of the sustainability of the grand scheme of things. Landscapes come and go, ecosystems come and go, species come and go, something old perish, something new emerge, the game goes on.

Our notion of sustainability is preservation of the current state (for human existence and dominance) indefinitely, Nature may have other ideas.

Evolution, by definition, takes place over many generations. Degradation of the environment can be much quicker, and often happens at a pace that evolution cannot keep up with.

If we don't pay attention to sustainability, we may produce a future world that cannot sustain even current populations of humans and wild things.

Australia is now seeing that in a big way with bleaching of its coral reefs, which could lead to a massive reduction in sea life on its continental shelf, which in turn could lead to big problems for people. All thanks to burning fossil fuels, by the way. That's what's poisoning the coral.

You are missing his point. His point is that the language of recycling, sustainability and so on, is a language that serves human goals, it is NOT a language expressing some sort of universal moral principle that applies to the whole universe. We talk about "wasted water" when it affects us, but we don't say that the Amazon is "wasting" massive amounts of water by moving it from the center of Brazil straight to the ocean.

It's fine to use this waste/recycle/sustain language in human contexts, because we are, after all, humans. But there are definitely some who get so carried away by this particular religion that they lose sight of the bigger picture.

Ultimately we don't need sustainability as the universe has provided us with a near infinite supply of resources. That being said, we need to plan for sustainability such that critical resources are not depleted in a manner detrimental to the greater good while enriching a few. Resource requirements change as technology advance.

A large part of Australia receives very little rainfall while some parts are definitely tropical and receive regular rainfall.

A large amount of rainwater falling in the urban areas ends up draining to the sea via sewage canals. There must be a practical way to collect all that fresh water.

In my country the Philippines, i have diverted the rainfall on my roof to a piece of my lot (instead of going into the municipal sewage system)and let the water pool there since it does drain into the soil and im hoping that in my own little way i can contribute to replenish the underground water table.

During the last big drought the plan was to add more dams and link up most of those eastern seaboard dams via pumps, so we'd be both more drought and also flood resistant. People got all NIMBY and the drought broke so problem solved.

As for diverting roof water, rain water tanks are pretty common here depending on where you live. They've been banned for being unsightly in some areas though.

lucky you. some regions of Calipornica USA, have strict restrictions regarding 'watta from heven'. put in a rain barrel and you get a visit from the county watta enforcement thugs. no joke!

A large part of Australia receives very little rainfall while some parts are definitely tropical and receive regular rainfall.

A large amount of rainwater falling in the urban areas ends up draining to the sea via sewage canals. There must be a practical way to collect all that fresh water.

In my country the Philippines, i have diverted the rainfall on my roof to a piece of my lot (instead of going into the municipal sewage system)and let the water pool there since it does drain into the soil and im hoping that in my own little way i can contribute to replenish the underground water table.

During the last big drought the plan was to add more dams and link up most of those eastern seaboard dams via pumps, so we'd be both more drought and also flood resistant. People got all NIMBY and the drought broke so problem solved.

As for diverting roof water, rain water tanks are pretty common here depending on where you live. They've been banned for being unsightly in some areas though.

lucky you. some regions of Calipornica USA, have strict restrictions regarding 'watta from heven'. put in a rain barrel and you get a visit from the county watta enforcement thugs. no joke!

In my area of Virginia, you get a tax credit for installing and using rain barrels. All the public housing units on the other side of town have giant rain barrels at the end of each building.

I use them for watering plants, but my house runs off a well, so it's moot.

it is ironic that attempts by humans to improve on natural systems that evolved over millennia turn out to be unproductive or even damaging, despite observation of short-term benefits.

Suppressing forest fires leading to overgrown forests susceptible to disease and increased fire risk, humans congregating in areas that don't have enough proximate resources to support the new population (but are pretty [California] or have lots of dead dinosaurs underground [Dubai]), growing food that is desirable, but not necessary, and uses water in excess of availability (such as Almonds @ 2,100 gal./lb., vs. ironically Watermelon @ 31 gal./lb.), introducing invasive, non-native species such as Kudzu for idealistic or commercial reasons without understanding the gaps in natural limiting factors in the receiving ecosystem.

Given the number of variables operating in any single ecosystem, it is surprising that humans think they can alter only a handful of parameters without causing long-term sustainability problems, despite the apparently positive short-term gains that accompany many decisions.

One wonders if ecosystem modification simulations would require more or less computing power than weather prediction; humans have gotten much better at weather prediction over the past century, but very few people would bet their lives on a prediction that it will be sunny 20 days in the future, what makes us think that terraforming is less complex?

To be fair, 1lb of almonds contains 2600 calories vs 136 calories for 1lb of watermelon (20x more) so the almonds are actually only consuming 3.5x the water on a per calorie basis.

Almonds also store/preserve substantially better than a watermelon that would rot fairly quickly, so you'd be willing to pay a water efficiency penalty for a longer-lasting (and thus logistically simpler and less prone to wastage) food source.

I believe evolution is the ultimate manifestation of the sustainability of the grand scheme of things. Landscapes come and go, ecosystems come and go, species come and go, something old perish, something new emerge, the game goes on.

Our notion of sustainability is preservation of the current state (for human existence and dominance) indefinitely, Nature may have other ideas.

Science has a very different idea: doom. No heat, no movement, no life, no nothing.

Some of us like to think a super natural being will save us, others think science will save us, not knowing that it is the very science they have faith in that guarantees our doom.

Talking about what will happen in 20 billion years to people who are interested in what's going to happen in 20 years is not a useful contribution to the discussion.

Actually, the reason for this is pretty simple. The current population of 6 Billion is not sustainable. Don't know what number is but I'm sure it's well short of 6 Billion. And, the only country that practices population is China and we know what they have to do to maintain population control. I would venture (just off the top of my head) that the sustainable population control is somewhere between 4-5 Billion. So, why don't we just start a world war and knock off a couple of billion and the rest are allowed to live. BTW, overpopulation is one of the main contributors to climate change since most of the 3rd world nations rely on fossil fuels (especially coal) to produce electricity (if they can at all) or very often just to stay warm and cook their food.

it is ironic that attempts by humans to improve on natural systems that evolved over millennia turn out to be unproductive or even damaging, despite observation of short-term benefits.

Suppressing forest fires leading to overgrown forests susceptible to disease and increased fire risk, humans congregating in areas that don't have enough proximate resources to support the new population (but are pretty [California] or have lots of dead dinosaurs underground [Dubai]), growing food that is desirable, but not necessary, and uses water in excess of availability (such as Almonds @ 2,100 gal./lb., vs. ironically Watermelon @ 31 gal./lb.), introducing invasive, non-native species such as Kudzu for idealistic or commercial reasons without understanding the gaps in natural limiting factors in the receiving ecosystem.

Given the number of variables operating in any single ecosystem, it is surprising that humans think they can alter only a handful of parameters without causing long-term sustainability problems, despite the apparently positive short-term gains that accompany many decisions.

One wonders if ecosystem modification simulations would require more or less computing power than weather prediction; humans have gotten much better at weather prediction over the past century, but very few people would bet their lives on a prediction that it will be sunny 20 days in the future, what makes us think that terraforming is less complex?

To be fair, 1lb of almonds contains 2600 calories vs 136 calories for 1lb of watermelon (20x more) so the almonds are actually only consuming 3.5x the water on a per calorie basis.

Almonds also store/preserve substantially better than a watermelon that would rot fairly quickly, so you'd be willing to pay a water efficiency penalty for a longer-lasting (and thus logistically simpler and less prone to wastage) food source.

While the flesh needs to be eaten quickly - watermelon seeds store well when dried, are edible, are more calorie dense than the flesh and have lots of protein. Watermelon rind can be preserved by pickling.

"Unfortunately, reforestation would also make water use less sustainable"

How so? That's not at all clear to me. Forests use up water through evaporation?

But don't forests also capture more rainfall that might otherwise run off or evaporate rapidly?

Either way, if it's reforestation, that intuitively suggests that it can't be worse than it was before people cut down the trees, no?

I suspect the issue (as land use seems to be the main theme here) is that reforestation means converting farmland back into forests, not empty desert expanses.

The same environment conductive to forest growth (water and fertile soil) is also going to make the same land the most viable farmland - at least in Australia. Taking away that farmland decreases food independence (the famine stalking Yemen is a graphic example of situations where reliance of imports of staples can be undesirable).

Furthermore, certain species are helped/adapt more easily to the land being repurposed for agriculture use and will be correspondingly negatively affected if the use is changed again (migrating waterfowl fattening up on the various grain fields they overfly in North America for instance).

Then there is the question of what type of agriculture will be affected. High-margin industries like vineyards are going to have a much higher economic opportunity cost in terms of government tax revenue and jobs. Cutting back on farms that cultivate fresh produce can have health repercussions if people start eating less fruits and vegetables because of the cost.

Then there's the carbon emissions associated with the increase in shipping (whether air or surface). Depending on the forest and the volume of shipping needed, reforestation may end up trading biodiversity directly against climate change reduction.

A large part of Australia receives very little rainfall while some parts are definitely tropical and receive regular rainfall.

A large amount of rainwater falling in the urban areas ends up draining to the sea via sewage canals. There must be a practical way to collect all that fresh water.

In my country the Philippines, i have diverted the rainfall on my roof to a piece of my lot (instead of going into the municipal sewage system)and let the water pool there since it does drain into the soil and im hoping that in my own little way i can contribute to replenish the underground water table.

During the last big drought the plan was to add more dams and link up most of those eastern seaboard dams via pumps, so we'd be both more drought and also flood resistant. People got all NIMBY and the drought broke so problem solved.

As for diverting roof water, rain water tanks are pretty common here depending on where you live. They've been banned for being unsightly in some areas though.

Where I live, they were banned until last year because of concern (or concern trolling, probably) about impact on streamflows. (Here in Colorado, we're at the head of rivers that impact millions of people.)

But it was always legal to direct whatever water fell on your roof directly into your garden, so

We're now limited to total storage of 110 gallons per home. Cisterns are right out. But ranchers have always built stock ponds that capture rainwater. My impression is that this is often (and perhaps most often) a violation of somebody else's water rights.

I believe evolution is the ultimate manifestation of the sustainability of the grand scheme of things. Landscapes come and go, ecosystems come and go, species come and go, something old perish, something new emerge, the game goes on.

Our notion of sustainability is preservation of the current state (for human existence and dominance) indefinitely, Nature may have other ideas.

We humans are the only species in the known universe with the capacity of forethought, creativity, complex problem solving.... we evolve. But we no longer require thousands of generations, we evolve ourselves and the universe around us.

We've modified the temperature of the planet through nearly two centuries of putting carbon dioxide (and thousands of other chemicals into the atmosphere), only we can change it.